|
Longevity and preventive maintenance
--
The basics. If you want to know how your water water heater is made
and what factors affect its longevity, start here. Topics:
- The
inside story -- How
a tank is made, why it breaks.
- Anodes
-- The hidden
ingredient -- that you can control -- that determines how long
a water heater lasts.
- Sediment
-- It dissolves
out of hard water, settling into the bottom of the heater, where
it makes scary noises, harms the tank bottom and burns out electric
elements and recirculation pumps.
- Safety
-- Your water
heater may not be as meek and mild as you think.
- Tankless
heaters -- Instantaneous
water heaters sound like a big improvement over tank-type heaters.
But are they?
- Choosing
a water heater
-- Configuration is a lot more important than brand.
- Preventive
maintenance -- What you need to do, through the years, to
keep your tank functioning efficiently and safely.
- Know-how
-- This is the hands-on guide to implementing preventive maintenance.
- The
Best Water Heater -- A few added parts will give you a superior
tank at big savings.
- Insulation
and energy efficiency -- Comparing water heaters has gotten
more complicated, but it can still be done, and should be done.
- Tools
-- We tell you to use certain tools to do certain maintenance
on water heaters. Here is a description of what those are and
what they do.
Troubleshooting
-- We offer several sections of written information, as well as
the opportunity to post your problem on our bulletin board, The
Tank. Topics are:
- Quick
-- Quick fixes, tips and caveats.
- Tanklets
-- Questions e-mailed to us in the early years of the site and
our answers, and interesting problems from The Tank.
- Stinky
water -- What to do if your water smells like rotten eggs
- Not
enough hot water -- It can have several wildly different causes,
and is one of the most common complaints.
- Lingo
-- Glossary of water heater terms. Topics:
Commercial
applications --
Water heater issues in commercial applications, such as apartment
complexes and restaurants.
Products,
order by shopping cart --
Rescuer kits can be used to retrofit an older tank or prefit a new
one. They include an anode rod, sediment flush kit, Water Heater
Workbook, instructions keyed to the book, a service sticker, and
pipe seal tape. Their component parts can be used as needed. Aluminum/zinc
anodes solve or reduce smelly water problems, and powered anodes
do that in softened systems. The flush kit blasts sediment out of
the tank. The book, by Larry and Suzanne Weingarten, is a cornucopia
of information.
Products,
order by PayPal --
This is our old payment system, where shipping was lumped into the
price as one-size-fits-all. We keep it as a backup because occasionally
the new cart locks someone out.
Products,
order by check --
Rescuer kits can be used to retrofit an older tank or prefit a new
one. They include an anode rod, sediment flush kit, Water Heater Workbook,
instructions keyed to the book, a service sticker, and pipe seal tape.
Their component parts can be used as needed. Aluminum/zinc anodes
solve or reduce smelly water problems. The flush kit blasts sediment
out of the tank. The book, by Larry and Suzanne Weingarten, is a cornucopia
of information.
Resources
-- Information and links to related sites.
About us
Contact us
Privacy policy
Antique
water heater museum
-- There's more than one way to heat water.
Here are some superior designs from the past:
The
Closet of Horrors -- Halloween can
be any night of the year. All you have to do is ignore your water
heater. These are some of the scarier of our inspection findings:
The
Harry Houdini Showcase
-- Showcase of water heater installations that only an escape artist
could hope to service.
The
House on Hummingbird Hill: Beginnings
-- In 1992, two people decided to build an incredible house that
would heat, cool and take care of itself..
The
House on Hummingbird Hill: Breaking the Rules
-- The Weingartens had unique ideas that they wanted to implement
in a house and they broke a few "rules" to do it -- or
maybe invented some new ones..
|
